Super political action committees, which allow for unlimited campaign spending, are one of the worst parts of American politics.
When you hear Elon Musk is spending almost half a billion dollars in these midterms, that is almost entirely because there are no limits to what he can donate to a super Pac. If he wanted to donate directly to a federal candidate, he’d face a $7,000 cap. A lot of money for some, but easy to counter by people who don’t post about Great Replacement theory.
When I ran this for the Massachusetts State House this year, I signed the “People’s Pledge” that I would reject super Pac spending on my behalf. It would ensure that anything spent in support of my campaign would flow through my campaign and therefore be subject to the even stricter campaign finance limits Massachusetts sets for state offices of $1,000 per individual per year.
And while my race, and others across the commonwealth, aren’t seeing the hundreds of millions of dollars that the Texas Senate race has, super Pacs can still make a big difference.
In Massachusetts in 2024 the average state Senate candidate spent $71,000. The average state House candidate in 2024 spent $33,000.
At those levels, relatively modest levels of outside spending could shape who represents us. And if a billionaire such as Musk ever wanted to involve themselves in a state legislature, they could easily spend more than every candidate combined.
What does the data tell us?
You can see all super Pac reports filed with the Office of Campaign and Political Finance here.
They’re a little hard to parse through, so I summarized all of them by candidate here. Here are the top 20 candidates by money spent for or against them.
What we find is that the majority of the super Pac spending was directed at the governor’s race, including $354,813 spent to fake-attack independent candidate Andrea James.
Legislative candidates saw less spent on them than the statewide offices, but some were considerably more as a percentage of the total spending in the race.
Latoya Gayle, who ran for the State Senate, spent $85,359 from her campaign account. She was supported by $101,594 in outside spending in support of her and $12,852 opposing her opponent, who was himself supported by $145,704 in super Pac spending.
In fact, of the top 25 candidate with money spent on their races, seven saw more outside spending than from their own campaign accounts. In the state Senate race in my district, an extremely expensive one, outside spending was cumulatively more than two of the five candidates raised.
Think about that for a moment.
In seven races, the majority of the money spent to help someone get elected (or, in Andrea James’ case, to use her to damage Maura Healey) was not subject to campaign finance limits and wasn’t even controlled by the candidate themselves – the person who would hold power in government if elected.
Does this matter?
There’s no way to definitively say when outside spending crosses from a part of politics to a major problem in it.
On the one hand, Republican nominee for governor Mike Minogue is likely to lose by more than 20 points despite more than $1.4 million helping him, equivalent to 27 percent of what Maura Healey’s campaign has spent this year.
On the other hand, I saw firsthand how much far less money can matter in a legislative race.
For a first-time candidate, name recognition and perceived viability are the biggest problems. Outside spending of $30,000 or so could have gotten me much greater awareness through constant mailers. I spent about $10,000 on two mailers and would have put every additional dollar at the end into a bigger list. That outside money had been a sign to potential endorsers that I might win and they should jump on the bandwagon. (Basically every endorsement interview included questions about fundraising and who else was supporting, which was one of the biggest surprises).
How bad could it get?
If anything, we may be lucky that super Pac spending isn’t more than it is right now.
Imagine you’re a company with an interest in some aspect of regulation. That company cannot donate to a candidate directly, but they could donate an unlimited amount to a super Pac.
The company is considering hiring another government affairs associate for the upcoming legislative cycle. Assume that they cost you $150,000 per year, or $300,000 for a two-year session.
Would it be more effective to get your message across to the Legislature if your firm put that money into backing 10 different House candidates?
Now switch that company with every interest group or rich person who wants their way. Under campaign finance laws, they’re restricted in what they can give to a candidate, meaning that no one group could exercise too much power, ensuring that candidates have to rely on a wide range of people for funding. If they campaign via super Pac, there’s no limit and you could theoretically see a trade body funding candidates in the same way they do ballot questions.
The problem is not just in Massachusetts. States across the country are vulnerable to the scale of money that can be spent by super Pacs. Rhode Island governor Dan McKee was hit with $500,000 in outside money in the last days of his primary this year. Meta planned to spend $65 million for state politicians.
No matter what happens Tuesday, it’s a problem we need to address before 2028.
